James Rhodes is a concert pianist and makes television programmes for Channel 4. He tours extensively and has recorded five albums for Signum and Warner Brothers. His website is www.jamesrhodes.tv and he is on YouTube at www.youtube.com/jamesrhodepianist.

The sexy, skinny model I found on the internet

A few days ago I did something that I feel rather ashamed of. I had spent all day working alone and was feeling tired but excited. I was also lonely. As a man, I sometimes get urges that are hard to control and before I knew it I was scouring the internet looking for a solution. It still amazes me what one can find online if you know where to look. I found several UK-based sites that catered to my needs. Not only that, but they had pictures of all the different models that I could choose from. After several hours I settled on the perfect one. Sexy, skinny (but not too waif-like), stunningly attractive yet also extremely smart, multi-lingual (even though originating from Hungary) and I was able to select all the extras I wanted online and at a pretty reasonable price. The site offered delivery to my door in a few hours; they also took credit cards (remarkably cheap too – I couldn't have got 15 minutes with a QC for what I had to pay).

A text arrived telling me what time to expect the bell to ring. An hour before the allotted time I was breathing heavily, my heart was racing and I found it hard to think about anything else other than the enormous turn on – the things we would do together, the pictures we would take, the chats we would have, the music we'd listen to, the videos we would watch, wondering how long we could last before having to rest and recharge.

And then sure enough, right on time, the bell rang and the moment arrived. I barely made it back up the stairs before I was ripping off the packaging and holding my brand new BlackBerry Bold 9900 in my hands.

Gadgets are one of my great weaknesses, and most of my record deal advance has gone on new toys (hence my scruffy clothes and pokey flat), so as soon as I saw that this had been released I just had to get one. I've been an Apple fan for many years, but recently I've started to tire of the incessant column inches devoted to the upcoming iPhone 5 (based purely on speculation and zeal), new product launches that are more secretive than the Catholic Church's legal depositions and the general air of smugness that comes in the (admittedly beautiful) box as a free extra. Apple now has more cash than America; it's surely time to let some of the other kids have a turn. As a company they are like the wealthy, good-looking, achingly cool, athletic yet academic kid in class who we all want to hang out with, secretly hoping some of their magic will rub off on us. And yet as time passes, maturity sets in and it becomes apparent that for all their skill and beauty, there is no real soul there. They look amazing, can score numerous tries and bang the hottest girls whilst acing their exams and yet, well, it's become a bit boring. As have most of their owners.

There's that lovely joke: "How do you know if someone has an iPhone? They'll tell you." And tell you they do. Which apps do what, what finger gesture rotates/zooms/pans/scrolls (I've got a finger gesture for you), how much music they have at their disposal and so on ad vomitum. Apple lucked out with the fabulously talented Jony Ive and have seemingly survived the extraordinary allegations of inhuman factory-conditions (where they probably have a Bring Your Parent to Work Day) but the shininess has worn off for me.

Now BlackBerrys, on the other hand, are the quiet, oddly secure kid who keeps his head down and knows that at some point their time will come and their special qualities will be discovered without the need to shriek them from the rooftop. Perhaps they've left it a little late in the day to take a stand against Apple, and don't get me started on the name RIM, but let me tell you – the 9900 is better than any phone out there at the moment. As far as I'm concerned, the iPhone 5 would have to come preloaded with home phone numbers and confirmed dinners with Cheryl Cole, Hugh Laurie, the Olsen twins, Helen Mirren and (in my case) Claudio Abbado to even begin to get me thinking about switching handsets. The 9900 took me less than 5 minutes to set up. Email, calendars, music (transferred over WiFi directly from iTunes!), photos, Twitter and contacts all done with a few button presses. Their syncing software is outstanding on both Mac and Windows, the battery lasts longer than Gandhi's epic hunger strikes and it has both a smooth, intuitive touchscreen coupled with an outstanding, proper keyboard. Not to mention it includes their new OS7, has the ability to remote-wipe/locate the phone, record video in high definition (with a potential 40GB of memory to fill), and pay for things by simply touching your phone against the till, Oyster-car style.

The icing on the cake for me is BlackBerry Messenger – the ability to send messages, voice recordings, pictures and whatnot to other BlackBerry users for no charge (on WiFi at least, the data charges are minimal and usually included). It's had a bad press of late, what with the rioting and all. But consider this: at least BBM is capable of organising civil unrest, even for those with rioter's block. If an iPhone user wanted to do that (Apple's autocorrect knowing better than you what you want to say, of course) their message would read: "Let's go cause he'll and stir shot up!" And they'd have paid £600 for the privilege.